The teachers’ learning mobility in Lithuania
On the 27th April the learning mobility of the international project “STEAM Model” of the “Erasmus+” program, intended only for teachers, started.
The teachers from Turkey and Portugal observed STEAM lessons given by lyceum teachers, discussed the STEAM methodology and its application in the educational process, shared the experiences of their countries, refined the essential aspects of STEAM lessons and agreed on a common concept.
The teachers spent the second mobility day of the “Erasmus+” project “STEAM Model” in a particularly practical way: a Portuguese biology teacher gave a STEAM lesson on the topic “Pulmonary Ventilation” to the lyceum students, the project teachers participated in the creative STEAM workshop called “How to breathe life into robots”, held by the non-formal education teacher Gintaras Jonaitis. During the session, the participants learned to program microcontrollers, use various sensors, automatically control LED lights, servemotors and perfectly coped with the assigned creative task – to create a moving bird that can be used, for example, to measure air cleanliness, lighting, and distance. The pieces for the bird were designed and cut by laser CNC machines by Jolita Stapurevičiūtė, a lyceum engineering teacher, so the teachers only had to connect the given scheme and program the movement of the wings. The end of the activity was crowned by the presentation of the performance of the birds produced and the enthusiastic support of each team. Later, the mobility participants visited the regional Panevėžys STEAM center, where they not only got to know the equipment and capabilities of the laboratories, but also tested some devices in practice, visited the Biology/Chemistry and Artificial Intelligence laboratories, played robot basketball in the Robotics/IT laboratory, and performed thermal salt tests in the Physics laboratory measurements and tested the methods of monitoring heat rays, as well as got acquainted with the intelligent hydroponic greenhouse maintained by the center’s employees, which is already undergoing its second evolution – the nutrient content of water impurities, temperature, humidity are automatically controlled, everything is monitored by a remote camera.
On the last day of the learning mobility the teachers from Turkey and Portugal gave STEAM lessons to lyceum students and participated in training of lyceum colleagues on STEAM strategy and specifics of education.
After the EKO flashmob held together with the lyceum community in the backyard and the EKO music performance by the project students, the week-long intensive and valuable project activities culminated in the certificate awarding ceremony.